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Classics Lectures

Hilary Term 2013

Greek and Latin Literature

III.1-2: Core Papers

Latin Literature of the First Century BC (Latin Core)

Dr S. J. Heyworth, Dr M J Robinson ; Thursday 10 ; Examination Schools

Week 1: Literature and intertextuality in the core texts. The lecture will start from Catullus’s passing observations on forensic rhetoric and then consider what Cicero says about poetry in the pro Archia, before moving on to specific reference to other writers and allusive marking of intertextuality, touching on all five poetic texts.

Week 2: Genre in Catullus 64 and Propertius; then intertextuality in the Eclogues, esp. Ecl. 3, 6, 8 and the constant reworking of Theocritus, and other authors.

Week 3: Allegory. What might encourage allegorical readings of these texts? Poetical allegory? Political allegory? Social allegory? [Mainly drawing on Vergil (Ecl. 5, 9) and Horace (1.14, 3.3, 3.27).]

Week 4: The interrelationship of poetry and politics: Ecl. 1, 4, 8, 9; the Roman Ode, Carm. 3.24-5 (with some background on Horace); Prop. 4 (with a survey of political aspects of earlier books).


III.3, 4, 7: Genre Papers

Comedy (Lectures)

Mr P. G. McC. Brown ; Tuesday 3:15 Wks 1-4 ; Ioannou Centre

As last term, instruction for this subject is provided by a combination of lectures and classes; for the classes students will be expected to write essays and make presentations. The classes are designed to complement the lectures, and those offering the subject should attend the lectures as well as the classes. One week will be devoted to each of the following plays, in order, in weeks 1-4: Bacchides, Pseudolus, Eunuchus, Adelphoe. The lectures will cover aspects of Bacchides 530-760, Pseudolus 1-380, Eunuchus 1-506 and Adelphoe 1-287 respectively. The student presentations will focus either on some of the scenes following those covered in the lectures or on more general questions.

The class in week 5 will give students a further opportunity to discuss the sort of more general questions that are likely to be set by the examiners at the beginning of week 6.


Comedy (Class)

Mr P. G. McC. Brown ; Thursday 4 Wks 1-5 ; Ioannou Centre

As last term, instruction for this subject is provided by a combination of lectures and classes; for the classes students will be expected to write essays and make presentations. The classes are designed to complement the lectures, and those offering the subject should attend the lectures as well as the classes. One week will be devoted to each of the following plays, in order, in weeks 1-4: Bacchides, Pseudolus, Eunuchus, Adelphoe. The lectures will cover aspects of Bacchides 530-760, Pseudolus 1-380, Eunuchus 1-506 and Adelphoe 1-287 respectively. The student presentations will focus either on some of the scenes following those covered in the lectures or on more general questions.

The class in week 5 will give students a further opportunity to discuss the sort of more general questions that are likely to be set by the examiners at the beginning of week 6.


Historiography (Class)

Dr R.E. Ash, Dr T. C. B. Rood ; Thursday 2-3:30 Wks 1-4 ; Merton College

These classes will take a thematic approach to a range of central issues at stake in the set-texts for the Historiography option. They are intended primarily for those taking the Historiography option for Greats. Others are welcome to attend, but only if they are prepared to be fully involved and to offer presentations as and when required.

Michaelmas Term

1. Proems
2. Battle Descriptions
3. Geography and Ethnography

Hilary Term

1. Speeches
2. Characterisation
3. Religion, gods, fate
4. General overview.


Lyric: Aspects of Transmission

Dr D. Obbink ; Wednesday 11 Wks 2-4 ; Christ Church

III.5, 6, 8: Greek Literature

Early Greek Hexameter Poetry: The Homeric Hymns and Hesiod I

Mr C. Metcalf ; Friday 11 Wks 1-4 ; Examination Schools

Early Greek Hexameter Poetry: The Homeric Hymns and Hesiod II

Dr M. Davies ; Wednesday 9 Wks 5-8 ; Ioannou Centre

Greek Tragedy: Aeschylus and Sophocles

Dr R. B. Rutherford ; Monday 11 Wks 1-7 ; Examination Schools

The series is aimed at those studying the option for Lit Hum. finals, but others are welcome. Total coverage is neither possible nor desirable, but the aim will be to provide some necessary information and to give some guidance on how to approach these complex texts.

1. Preliminaries; Aeschylus, Agamemnon.
2. Agamemnon, ctd.
3. Choephori.
4. Eumenides.
5. Sophocles, Oed.Tyrannus.
6. Electra.
7. Oedipus at Colonus.


Hellenistic Poetry

Dr J.L. Lightfoot ; Monday 2 Wks 1-6 ; New College

This series complements and completes the course of Hellenistic poetry lectures last term.

Week 1: Aetiology and Callimachus' Aitia

Week 2: Varieties of epic: the so-called epyllion.

Week 3: Epigram.

Week 4: Alexandria and the Ptolemies: poetry and royalty.

Week 5: Learned poetry and ivory towers

Week 6: Hellenism: Greece, Egypt, and the Near East


III.9, 10, 11, 12: Latin Literature

Cicero the Orator

Prof. G. O. Hutchinson ; Monday 9 ; Examination Schools

These lectures are meant for primarily for the literary option on Cicero. Those offering Cicero: Politics and Thought in the Late Republic (and indeed anyone else) are welcome to come too; they may find more to interest them in the first five weeks.

1. Drama
2. Opposition
3. Praise
4. War
5. Knowledge
6. Heaping
7. Twisting
8. Meta-rhetoric


Latin Didactic: Georgics and Ars Amatoria

Dr R. M. Armstrong ; Wednesday 11 ; St Hilda's College, Lady Brodie Room

Weeks 1-4: Georgics
Weeks 5-6: Ars Amatoria


Neronian Literature

Dr K. Earnshaw, Dr L. V. Pitcher ; Friday 2-4 ; St John's College (Weeks 1-4); Ioannou Centre (Weeks 5-8)

Weeks 5-8: Dr L Pitcher

Week 5: Seneca - Apocolocyntosis.

Week 6: Calpurnius Siculus.

Week 7: Petronius I

Week 8: Petronius II


Ovid, Fasti IV

Dr L. V. Pitcher ; Thursday 11 Wks 1-4 ; Examination Schools

Week 1: The Time of My Life - The Fasti and the Poet's Career.

Week 2: A Brief History of Time - The Fasti and Ancient Chronography.

Week 3: Show Time - The Fasti and Roman Exemplarity.

Week 4: In Search of Lost Time - The Receptions of the Fasti and the Exile Poetry.


III.13, 14: Textual Criticism

Euripides, Orestes Palaeography

Dr G R Parpulov ; Tuesday 11 Wks 5-8 ; Ioannou Centre

Euripides, Orestes Papyrology

Dr D. Obbink ; Tuesday 11 Wks 1-4 ; Christ Church

Euripides, Orestes Text

Dr S. Scullion ; Friday 2-4 ; Worcester College, Seminar Room A

Latin Textual Criticism: Catullus

Prof. S. J. Harrison, Dr S. J. Heyworth ; Tuesday 5-6:30 Wks 1-6 ; Wadham College

Classics and English Link Papers

Tragedy (Classical and Reception)

Dr F. Macintosh ; Thursday 2 ; Examination Schools

Graduate Seminars and Classes

Advanced Literary Papyrology

Dr D. Obbink ; Tuesday 1 ; Christ Church

Ancient Philosophy Seminar

Prof. D.O.M. Charles, Prof. T.H. Irwin ; Thursday 5-6:30 ; Radcliffe Humanities, Ryle Room

Byzantine Hagiography

Prof. M Lauxtermann ; Friday 12 ; Ioannou Centre

Byzantine Text Seminar

Prof. M Lauxtermann ; Friday 10-11:30 ; Ioannou Centre

Corpus Christi Classical Seminar: The Construction of the Canon in Antiquity

Dr P Avlamis, Dr S. Hitch ; Wednesday 5-6:30 ; Corpus Christi College

Week 1 (16 January): Johanna Hanink (Brown) and Anna Uhlig (Cambridge)
'σκότος γάρ ἐστιν Αἰσχύλου τεθνηκότος: The Posthumous Life and Works of Aeschylus'

Week 2 (23 January): Robert Fowler (Bristol)
'Mythography and other sub-literary genres'

Week 3 (30 January): Andrew Ford (Princeton)
'Turning the Cannon on Homer: the catalogue of ships in Euripides' IA'

Week 4 (6 February): Emily Pillinger (KCL)
'Litterae and tabulae rasae in Latin poetry'

Week 5 (13 February): Dirk Obbink (Oxford)
'Sappho and the Epic Canon'

Week 6 (20 February): Ahuvia Kahane (RHUL)
'From Thersites to Trimalchio: Canon, Genre, and Historical Time'

Week 7 (27 February): Larry Kim (Trinity College, USA)
'Dionysius of Halicarnassus, classicism and Asianism'

Week 8 (6 March): William Fitzgerald (KCL)
'How to be minor'


Gender, Literature and Culture Seminar

Dr P. Goulimari; Tuesday 2 Wks 2, 4, 7 ; Examination Schools

Tuesday 22 January (Week 2), 2 p.m.:
Vergine Gulbenkian, storyteller and folklorist, will be telling and singing her "State of Matter: Tales about Burning", fuelled by a 16th-century love epic.

Tuesday 5 February (Week 4), 2 p.m.:
Dr Anita Kurimay (European University Institute, Florence)
Rethinking the Margins: Hungarian Sexuality in Interwar Europe

Tuesday 26 February (Week 7), 2 p.m.:
Dr April Gallwey (University of Warwick)
Single Motherhood in England post-1945




Gods and Humans

Prof. C. B. R. Pelling, Dr S. Scullion ; Monday 5-6:30 ; Ioannou Centre

Graduate Work In Progress: Languages and Literature

Miss A. Buglass, Mr T. Mackenzie; Friday 4:15-5:30 ; Ioannou Centre

All graduate students are warmly invited to present an aspect of their current research or a piece they are working on to their peers. The setting is relatively informal with no senior faculty members and is complete with tea and biscuits. The presentations are followed by discussion and questions. All very welcome.


Jewish History and Literature in the Graeco-Roman Period: Graduate Seminar

Prof. M.D. Goodman ; Tuesday 2:30-4 ; Oriental Institute

Week 1 (15 January): Tessa Rajak (Somerville) and Martin Goodman, 'The reception of Josephus to 1750'

Week 2 (22 January): QUMRAN FORUM : Joan Taylor (King's College London), 'The Essenes, the Scrolls, and the Dead Sea' (chaired by Geza Vermes (Director of the Qumran Forum))

Week 3 (29 January): James Kugel (Bar-Ilan University and Harvard University), 'The book of Jubilees and ancient biblical interpretation'

Week 4 (5 February): Michael Avioz (Bar-Ilan University), 'Josephus' interpretation of the Book of Samuel'

Week 5 (12 February): Jang S. Ryu (University), 'Philo's discourses of knowledge between Alexandria and Rome'

Week 6 (19 February): Laliv Clenman (Leo Baeck College and King's College London) , 'The Palestinian Talmud and Pinchas the Zealot'

Week 7 (26 February): Arye Edrei (Tel-Aviv University), 'A split diaspora?'

Week 8 (5 March): George Carras (Washington and Lee University), 'Torah observance in diaspora Judaism: Josephus, Philo and Pseudo-Phocylides'


Languages and Literature Sub-Faculty Seminar: Ancient Scholarship and Literary Texts

Mr T Phillips, Mr B Taylor ; Thursday 5-6:30 ; Ioannou Centre

Week 1 (17th January): Tim Rood (St. Hugh's) 'Thucydides and Homeric Scholarship'

Week 2 (24th January): Tom Phillips (CCC) 'Intertextuality and Ancient Pindaric Scholarship'

Week 3 (31st January): Richard Hunter (Trinity, Cambridge) 'Plutarch's Works and Days, and Hesiod's'

Week 4 (7th February): David Butterfield (Queens', Cambridge) 'Lucretius' DRN: the subject of scholarly enquiry in antiquity?'

Week 5 (14th February): Helen Kaufmann (Oxford) 'Hide and seek: the construction of meaning in Roman late antiquity'

Week 6 (21st February): Oliver Thomas (St. John's, Cambridge) 'Problemata and Commentary'

Week 7 (28th February): Giuseppe Pezzini (LMH) 'tela volantia: Caesar's De Analogia and the Latin linguistic debate in the late Republic'

Week 8 (7th March): Jane Lightfoot (New College) 'Between literature and science, poetry and prose, Alexandria and Rome: the case of Dionysius' Periegesis of the Known World'


Latin Textual Criticism: Catullus

Prof. S. J. Harrison, Dr S. J. Heyworth ; Tuesday 5-6:30 Wks 1-6 ; Wadham College

Oxford Philological Society

Dr A. D. Kelly, Dr J.R.W. Prag ; Friday 5:30 Wks 2, 4, 6 ; Balliol College, Lecture Room 23

Week 2 (Friday 25 January): Dr Antonio Naco del Hoyo (Barcelona): 'Intelligence and politics in Mithridates VI's time'

Week 4 (Friday 8 February): Prof Adam Ziolkowski (Warsaw): 'The gates of Pre-Servian Rome and the territorial expansion of the Archaic City'

Week 6 (Friday 22 February): Dr Kostas Vlassopoulos (Nottingham): 'Epigraphies of Slavery'

All are welcome, and wine and soft drinks will be served. Those wishing to dine with the speaker afterwards should contact the secretary (adrian.kelly@balliol.ox.ac.uk) by 5.00 pm Thursday the evening before the paper.




Plato Reading Group

Mr T. Moore, Mr D. Kranzelbinder; Wednesday 7-9 Wks 2, 4, 6, 8 ; Ioannou Centre

This term the PRG will be reading the Phaidon.

Week 2: 57a-72d

Week 4: 72e-84b

Week 6: 84c-102a

Week 8: 102b-118a (end)

For the full PRG termcard please email Daniel Kranzelbinder or Thomas Moore.





Research Techniques in Classical Literature (Graduate Seminar)

Prof. S. J. Harrison, Prof. C. B. R. Pelling ; Friday 2:15-4 ; Corpus Christi College

Data last updated 23 January 2013 , 02:07 PM.